Rian could not believe this was happening a second time. 

Alta adjusted slightly in his lap, moaning softly as the movement shifted the knot that still bound them together. Rian was lucid, again, and this time he knew it was real. He remembered the slow descent back into his rut, how he had managed to take a shower, record the video and he had even managed to call his parents to let them know what happened. But he also remembered how the heat grew, how even after Ysemna restrained him, he cursed at her, demanding her to let him have his omega back.

And now that omega was in his lap again, connected to him again. 

Alta.

“Why does this keep happening?” Rian breathed, gently rubbing circles into Alta’s back as he fought to stay still. He felt as the man in his lap laughed, his fingers threading lazily through Rian’s hair.

“My guess would be because I’m not human.”

“Not human?”

“Already told your boss, but I’m a genie,” Alta breathed and Rian nodded, taking a deep breath. Well, that explained the locked door and if his options were magic or his car failing, he preferred magic as an explanation. “I’m bound to a master, not you, and I have to grant their wishes. More than three though.”

“Do you have like… a lamp or something?” Rian felt a bit silly asking, and Alta’s laugh rumbled low in his chest, warm and oddly fond, and Rian felt the vibration through every point where their bodies touched.

“I don’t, but other genies might.” Alta answered and Rian frowned as he heard a slight shift in Alta’s voice. “Mine is different.”

“Can you tell me?”

“No.” Alta’s answer was short and clipped, making Rian fall silent. He didn’t need to see Alta’s face to know there was tension there, something deep-seated and closed off like a door slammed and bolted from the inside. Rian let his hand drift slowly up and down Alta’s spine, unsure if it was for comfort or distraction. The aftershocks of his rut were still skimming through his nerves, not the desperate fire from before, but an echoing ache, a physical hum in his bones and blood that hadn’t fully quieted.

Still, it was Alta's words that buzzed louder in his head.

A genie. Magic. Wishes.

“So is your magic making me lucid?”

“It's more likely my pheromones are bypassing whatever is wrong with your NPP,” Alta continued softly, the edge in his voice easing into something gentler. “Maybe genie pheromones are different.”

“Maybe,” Rian agreed, wishing he could lay down. His hips were starting to hurt but he didn’t dare move too much. Not with the knot still holding them together, not with Alta’s body still curled against him like they belonged there. The moment held a strange stillness, as though even the air around them had settled into quiet reverence. “Once it goes down, we can shower again.”

“Oh so you did clean me and redo my braid,” Alta chuckled and Rian allowed himself a small laugh. “Pretty nice for someone you were gonna press charges against.

“I didn't know what else to do with all your hair. Besides you were… bleeding,” Rian’s voice dropped as guilt stirred behind his ribs, sharp and cold. “I didn’t want to leave you like that.”

Alta shifted again, a quiet sound escaping him that made Rian’s hips want to bring them closer, but he resisted, continuing his careful stroking. Alta’s voice was gentle. “That wasn’t from you. I’ve had… a rough week.”

The resignation in  those few words scraped over Rian’s nerves like jagged glass. A rough week. That could’ve meant anything, but in Alta’s tone, it sounded like a deliberate understatement, like someone putting a tarp over a collapsed building and calling it a small leak. Rian’s body tensed beneath him, his muscles drawn taut even as he fought not to move. His instincts snarled anyway.

Who hurt you?

The question hovered in his chest, too loud to voice, too dangerous to answer. He could feel it now; Alta’s body still molded to his, but smaller somehow. Not in size, but in energy. Like something in him had curled up tight, coiled for protection. His fingers traced the ridges of Alta’s spine again, slower this time, and he tilted his head to press a kiss against Alta’s temple, because that was all he could do. 

“I don’t know what I want to do when this ends,” Rian said softly. “But I… will do my best not to hurt you.”

“Well, you’re going good so far,” Alta chuckled, and Rian nodded, pressing another kiss to Alta’s face. “How long do you have? Before you lose it?”

“I’m not sure when I fully went under, but I was fully aware for around five hours.”

“So sex every four hours should keep you from losing your mind,” Alta finished for him, voice still light but threaded with something heavier underneath. He shifted again, and this time Rian felt the knot beginning to ease, muscles clenching instinctively to keep it there, to keep Alta close.

Rian huffed a breath, half exasperation, half resignation. “Don’t say it like that.”

“Like what?” 

“Like you’re a prescription,” Rian glanced down, his fingers curling into the hair at the base of Alta’s neck. “You are still a person, regardless of whether or not you’re human.”

Alta didn’t move. His breath caught, just slightly, but Rian felt it. He felt his anger flare again, but he did his best to swallow it back down. It flared hot in his chest, bright, primal, irrational. Something ancient and bone-deep that snarled at the idea of Alta being treated like a utility, like an object, even by his own words.

“You’re a sweetheart, you know that,” Alta finally breathed and Rian chuckled. That he was used to hearing. “Gonna make me fall for you at this rate.”

“Don't say that,” Rian insisted, testing the size of the knot as he gently lifted Alta’s hips. It felt small enough to pull free now, but he hesitated, not wanting to hurt him. He moved slowly, bracing Alta with one arm as he shifted under him, breathing through the low ache and scream in his blood that said not to do this. Alta let out a low hum, fingers tightening slightly in Rian’s hair, but he didn’t complain.

As they finally separated, Rian guided Alta into his arms, careful, steady, as if handling something sacred. He tucked the omega against his chest, cradling him in the circle of his body. His legs ached from the hours he had been strapped to his own bed, but he stood slowly, adjusting Alta in his arms. Rian buried his nose in Alta’s shoulder, breathing him in like it could anchor him. 

“Alright,” Rian started toward his bathroom, taking his time so he didn’t trip over his own weakened legs. The warm water felt like a balm and Rian sat on the bench in his shower, just letting the water wash over them. He had never been happier for a rain shower in his life.

He needed to call Ysemna to let her know they were okay, needed to let her know the danger had passed. But even as that thought settled, Rian was in no hurry to move. Even with the worst behind him, his body felt like a frayed wire, sparking with leftover current.

“Can I ask something?” Rian’s voice cracked slightly, and he felt Alta shift in acknowledgment.

“Sure.”

“When you said you’re not human, do you mean not at all? Or…” Rian hesitated, unsure how to phrase it. If Alta was magic, did a human crime even matter? “Are you part human? Were you born or made?”

“I’m not human at all, but I was born,” Alta answered, a bit of humor in his tone as he spoke. Rian loosened his hold as Alta stood, stretching under the water as Rian took in the view. Alta was very nice to look at and Rian glanced away as Alta glanced over his shoulder. There was a flicker of something unreadable in his expression, and Rian finally noticed that Alta’s heat eyes were the softest lilac color. 

They were too perfect for his face.

Rian didn’t realize he had stood until he was cradling Alta’s face in his hands, those soft lilac eyes searching his face like it held answers to questions he hadn’t even asked yet. His thumbs brushed gently over the ridges of Alta’s cheekbones, feeling the warmth beneath his skin, the slight tremble in his jaw as though he was barely holding something back.

“You’re… mine.”

“Yeah,” Alta agreed. “I’m yours.”

Rian didn’t know what to do with that answer. This wasn’t something he chose. “You don’t have to be.”

“The mark on my hand says otherwise. Rut while paired is worse without your mate.”

“You don’t know me. You could have left.”

“I…” Alta’s voice cracked, barely audible over the hum of the water around them. He looked away, his lashes heavy with moisture. “I made you mark me. I don’t get to just abandon you after I forced this.”

Rian nodded slowly, even as his drenched hair was sticking to his face, warm water sluicing over his shoulders and chest like it might wash away the storm still roiling inside him. H part of him was still rightfully angry, but it was also clear he had a reason, even if he wasn’t saying it. He reached up, brushing the dripping strands of Alta’s hair back from his forehead even as he frowned. 

He didn’t like this, but he didn’t know what to do.

“Can I kiss you?” Rian asked, not trying to sound gentle. He knew it was silly; after all, he must have already kissed Alta at least once for them to be paired in the first place. Yet, Rian wanted to make it his, to do it on his terms, not Alta's. His rut stole enough choices from him and if Alta’s pheromones gave him some control back, he was gonna use it.

Alta blinked, as if a little surprised, before an almost patronizing smirk spread on his face. Rian moved his hands to Alta’s waist as the omega moved closer to him, wrapping his arms around Rian’s neck again. 

“Why?”

“Because you made me before, and now I want to.” Rian answered honestly, watching Alta’s eyes light up slightly. “I’ll do it whether you say yes or no.”

“It might trigger my heat to flare up early.”

“So now it’s a problem?” Rian shot back, pressing their bodies together. “Didn’t stop you earlier.”

“No, it didn’t,” Alta said softly and Rian took a deep breath as Alta pulled him down, their lips meeting in a kiss that was surprisingly gentle, considering everything their bodies had been through. Rian pressed a little more and Alta opened up willing, his lips parting as Rian deepened the kiss, already feeling the familiar hunger. 

Alta’s hands slid up Rian’s back, tracing the curve of muscle and scar tissue, his fingers almost reverent and Rian felt the need curl low in his stomach. He pulled back, panting from a heat that had nothing to do with the warm water.

“We should–”

“It’s okay. I’m the same,” Alta interrupted, and Rian groaned as he saw the look on Alta’s face. How the fuck was he supposed to say no that look? A look that begged for him, and him alone. “Please.”

Rian swallowed hard, the sound of Alta’s please echoing somewhere deep in his spine. That single word cracked through him, as potent as any command. His fingers flexed against Alta’s waist, every inch of him caught between restraint and the fraying edge of surrender. He slid his hands down, gripping behind Alta’s thighs as he bent slightly and lifted him with care. Alta wrapped his legs around Rian’s waist without hesitation, his arms tightening behind his neck, and for a second, Rian felt that same primal snap in his blood, that deep, unrelenting knowledge that this was right. 

There was no stopping what was coming, but at least he was aware for once.